Following a successful start to the OneTen series presented by Infinity in Shanghai back in October, the series organisers are excited to go to Hong Kong for the 3rd and 4th round of the championship on the 1st and 2nd of December. Held at the awesome TRC facility, the series will have its first outdoor round run on control Sweep tires as we look forward to welcoming all the local Hong Kong racers. With such a high level of competition in the country, and with all the remaining rounds of the series held in this region, we can expect to see a lot of drivers to kick off their championship challenges at this race. Joining the locals at this event, we can again confirm entries from round 1 & 2 Modified class winner Akio Sobue, as well as his Japanese Infinity team mate Jin Sawada. Jan Ratheisky, who dominated the Scorpion powered Stock class at RCI V2 will once again return to race both classes. Unable to attend the opening rounds due to personal reasons, Nicholas Lee will hope to get his title ambitions kicked off in style as he heads the Yokomo challenge at TRC. More information about this, and all future, rounds of the series can be found here, while entry for rounds 3 & 4, which like all rounds is limited to 100 entries, is now open here.

Carrying forward their form from the opening round of the OneTen Series presented by Infinity yesterday, top qualifiers Akio Sobue and Jan Ratheisky have won their respective Sweep Modified and Scorpion Stock A-mains. The single 8-minute final saw the grid completed with Lao Minhao winning the B-main to bump up to the A-main. In a rather dominant performance Sobue won his final by 6 seconds from Jan followed by a hard charging Jin Sawada. The German taking the tie break for the overall Shanghai standings due to his fastest lap in today’s final, having had equal results in both the overall result and qualifying across both days. Gary Huang and Rocket Zhang completed the top 5.

Akio was very pleased with his race and also his Infinity IF14, saying it was perfect all weekend. He also commented that the race was very clean and traffic not a problem at all, despite the 10 cars on the small RCI V2 track. Pulling out such a margin early on in the race, the Japanese driver said he took it easy in the last few minutes and drove it steady to the end.

Ratheisky said, ‘I tried to follow Akio, but it became too risky so I took it easy in the last minutes’. Knowing the tie break system, managing to stay in second he needed the fastest lap so pushed very hard in the beginning and it worked out. Slowing near the end to bring it home, he knew Jin would come but the German commented that ‘catching is one thing, but blocking on this track is easy’.

Sawada said his race was only ‘so so’, but with his car the best it had been all weekend he was able to push Jan near the end of the final but as the Xray driver commented it is very tight and difficult to pass here.

Top Chinese driver in Shanghai, National Champion Gary Huang came good in the final. Like Jin, he felt he only managed to find a good setup by the time the final came along and was able to start very fast, however the car started to slide after about 2 minutes and he wasn’t able to push for 3rd in the race.

The Stock class, which uses handout Scorpion 13.5T motors, saw some very close racing behind the winner Ratheisky. With Jan checking out early and slowing up near to end to avoid ruining the 2nd placed battle between Heng Heng and Masaaki Kyoyi which lasted almost the entire 8-minutes. A small mistake 5 laps in saw the Japanese driver drop back to 3rd behind Kenny Yan, but he was able to regain the position and go back after Heng. In the end the pair were separated by only 0.5 seconds with Heng benefitting from the inability to pass here, meaning Kyoyi had to settle for the final podium spot.

Qualifying is complete at RCI V2 and the grids for the 2nd round of the championship have been finalised, having confirmed our class top qualifiers following the Q3. Joining Akio Sobue at the sharp end of the grid in the single 8-minute Sweep Modified A-main will be Jan Ratheisky in 2nd, Jin Sawada, who retired from the final qualifier in 3rd, followed by Gary Huang, Rocket Zhang and Nicholas Koh rounding out the top 5. Young Xray driver Lao Minhao will have to try and bump up from the B-main, having just qualified 10th. The Scorpion Stock class A-main will see pole man Ratheisky joined by an improving Heng Heng in 2nd, Masaaki Kyoyi in 3rd, with Kenny Yan and Simon Wang completing the top half of the grid. Mao Yujin took 10th and so will line up on pole position for the B-main.

Akio Sobue is the top qualifier for the Modified class at the 2nd round of the OneTen Series presented by Infinity at RCI V2 in Shanghai. The Japanese driver, who dominated the opening round of the series yesterday, made it 3 from 3 in qualifying as he once again headed the times, this time ahead of team mate Jin Sawada. Jan Ratheisky ensured the top 3 remained consistent as he ended up less than 4 tenths back. The ongoing battle between Gary Huang and Nicholas Koh continued with the Xray pairing separated by half a second, ending the round 4th and 5th respectively.

In preparation for the single 8 minute final Infinity driver Sobue fully charged his ORCA battery to increase runtime while lowering the settings on the speedo to reduce the extra punch as a result. Obviously happy with wrapping up the TQ the current TITC Champion will continue to test in the final qualifier to be safe for the longer race.

Xray driver Jan Ratheisky took 3rd for the round, the German feeling his T4 was faster, which reflected in his lap times but which was slower over the run than his fastest time he set in Q2. Some 2 seconds of his quickest time, with two 2nd place finishes compared to Jin’s one 2nd and a 3rd, along with the faster run time, Jan has a very good chance to split the Infinity drivers.

While never in doubt, Ratheisky also took the overall TQ in the Scorpion Stock class, putting in another master class to take the round from Heng Heng, with Masaaki Kyoyi, Kenny Yan and Simon Wang completing the top 5 for the round.

Remarks – Shanghai based Yokomo driver Motor King is running a BD8 that features a custom machined aluminium chassis plate that has more cutouts to give the whole car more flex and a top deck from Vigor RC. Starting with his base RCI V2 setup, due to lower than normal traction he has removed the 1mm bulkhead spacer and made his shocks lay down more. Still a little difficult to control especially after the first 2 minutes, he is thinking to change to a narrower rear suspension mount and softer shock spring.